User:Buzzo/final project proposal

Project Proposal 24th November 2017

Project title.

Almost Helpful : A gameable interface for literary research with search engines.

Keywords / Themes

• Big Data
• Search Engines
• Filter Bubble
• Linked Data
• Incremental Gaming
• Progressive Disclosure
• Slow Search
• Serendipitous Search
• Semantic Web
• Interface Design
• User Experience
• Relational Databases
• Artificial Intelligence
• Machine Learning.

Description of the project

I want to make a search engine with a gameable interface, a research tool with a playful way to discover new material. This will be a playful artistic intervention that takes and tweaks influence and input from the user to bring interesting and unexpected results. Implementing notions taken from slow technology.

“Slow technology focuses on envelopment rather than development...” Lars HALLNÄS

What do I want to make? (Intro // Abstract)

I will build a playable interface as a means of engaging with my search engine. I would propose a different interface for exploring these digital libraries, one which can be re-configured and explored through the actions of a wandering reader. I want to move away from “the query” as the way of discovering or finding information within a selection of content, and instead to focus on the amble / unstructured walk / slow reveal as a means of search and discovery. I want to increase the ways in which one can explore information.

I would like to focus on the active participation of the searcher to directly influence their search results. This steers me away from search results that are generated through passive activity of the searcher, ie previous browsing and recent online activity used to tailor the results. The actions of the player within the game will tweak the search algorithm and generate different results for each player. The algorithm for the search engine will change according to user input through a gameable interface. This will allow room for a range of outcomes and generate new and unexpected outcomes whilst still remaining relevant to the individual. In this way I hope to create a useful and playful tool to help users find things outside of their filter bubble and provide material from outside of their usual search areas. From here I turn to Kevin Kelly the author of What Technology Wants who states the following:

“As a practical matter I’ve learned to seek the minimum amount of technology for myself that will create the maximum amount of choices for myself and others.”

I want to increase the ways in which one can explore information, and the above quote reminds me that the aim of the project is to use simple, accessible, and recognisable formats, thus maintaining the focus on the content and forthcoming results, and not on the technology used to facilitate them. I would use this interface as a guide/companion in the hope to give those undertaking research, other options and ways of searching. I would like this to be an alternative experimental look at ways of discovering information and resources. I am interested in looking at the notion and idea of serendipity within the search process. Touching on the subject of slow-searching to allow for time and valuable reflection within the search method.

“invite the searcher into a reflective search activity, by slowing down the search process and thus encouraging them to be mindful of their intentions, present in their interactions, and reflective about what is presented to them.” Dörk, Bennett, Davies

I am using slow searching to reference the allocation of time and allowances made for the digestion of information, I feel it is a necessary process to be used to deal with the immediacy offered to us by current search engines.

Why do I want to make it?

Through a personal interest in nonfiction literature such as guide books and D.I.Y books through to encylopedias and collections. Also from a sparked interest in nonsense collections such as, in some opinions The Voynich Manuscripts, The codex seraphinianus and Joseph Cornell’s Manual of Marvel’s… Also through archives such as the Phaidon Archive of Graphic design that was designed in single sheets to be open to the reader for non-linear dissemination, to organise in any way one chooses. Childhood books such as the journey to the land of spice and treasure. To quote Luis Serafini “looking to evoke that childlike wonder” upon discovery, I want to tap into the emotional attachment that comes from frontiership, the first to find something the first to discover something. I find that we place more value upon knowledge which we have intrinsically discovered or learned by ourselves without assistance.

“Leave the door open for the unknown, the door into the dark. That’s where the most important things come from, where you yourself came from, and where you will go.” Rebecca Solnit, a Field Guide to Getting Lost

How do I plan to make it?

The project will be developed using nodejs, using this programming language to index and search through online databases. The first step of the project is to work out the exact parameters of a search engine and from there to tweak the results with direct input from the user, for example switching certain search words to a close synonym or to flip to the opposite meaning. In this respect the results displayed will still be relevant and recognisable but also unexpected.

This project will develop through hands on experiments that will inform ways to tweak my search engine algorithms, and other elements to introduce within the framework of the game. The first stage of the project is to recognise the parameters I wish to work within, once I have worked out where the current and existing edges of my area of research are, I can choose which direction to push in. These experiments will directly inform the ways in which I will play with the recipe for the algorithm. From here I will make an informed choice as to the best way of implementing my idea.

I have chosen to have the search results appear with my game interface in the style of loot drops, in other words random items which a player can chance upon within the game. This encourages the player to keep moving and keep reaping the rewards of travelling throughout the game world to find more and more items. Through the players actions here, depending on their playing style I will further tweak their results to better improve the game and to keep their interest.

This will not be a game in a traditional sense, through research into text based games and Choose Your Own Adventure (CYOA) games, I have found that having a visible character upon the screen may not be entirely necessary and this I will work out through my initial prototyping stages.

What is my timetable?

The first step of my project is to build a search engine and work out in which part of the process I can implement my interface. This interface is where we take cues from the player/searcher to tweak the algorithm that connects with the search engine, and returns the relevant material to the player again. As soon as I have the framework I can begin trial runs and user testing to see where I can improve upon the initial prototype.

Relation to previous practice

My previous work has focussed on the human factor within digital publications, and how this can be introduced to create an ad-hoc social network “on-the-fly”. I looked at the idea of stamping (physical trait taken from traditional libraries) and implemented this to digital documents accumulatively to show a shadow and presence of other “readers” within a space, to create an awareness of people within these archives. Reintroducing the human factor to digital publications. This is the same thing I am hoping to achieve with my interface for search engines.

Relation to larger context

With the current situation that surrounds online research, a certain back seat driver effect is in place and I feel leads to a passive researcher who does not feel as connected to or as excited about their discoveries when it transpires that everyone else is reading the same thing or that it has already been referenced or in the parameters of “of course you would reference miss XYZ because you are an X studying X in the city of X” In today’s current social climate I feel that it is becoming increasingly harder to find the place where one can realistically have discovered something outside of one's current filter bubble. Also outside of one’s own social filter bubble we still encounter the hurdles of trying to search for things anonymously, yet still wish to reap the benefits of relevant search. Large amounts of things we are shown are due to their relatability to previous things we have browsed for, searched for and engaged with, in other words our online footprint helps as well as hinders us along the way. There are truly inconceivable amounts of literature stored as big data somewhere just waiting to be explored, as mentioned by Jean-Francois Lyotard

“Data banks are the Encyclopedia of tomorrow. They transcend the capacity of each of their users. They are "nature" for postmodern man.”

This quote resonates with me, as the idea of data banks as the Encyclopedia of our current generation, doesn’t quite match with the current state of databanks. To me encyclopedias are exciting things, filled with a wealth of knowledge that one could happily spend hours pouring over, a place where you could happily stumble across things. I want our archives and datasets to evoke that same wonder.

References///QUOTES

Lars HALLNÄS “Slow technology focuses on envelopment rather than development...”

Dörk, Bennett, Davies “invite the searcher into a reflective search activity, by slowing down the search process and thus encouraging them to be mindful of their intentions, present in their interactions, and reflective about what is presented to them.”

Kevin Kelly, What Technology Wants “As a practical matter I’ve learned to seek the minimum amount of technology for myself that will create the maximum amount of choices for myself and others.”

Jean-Francois Lyotard “Data banks are the Encyclopedia of tomorrow. They transcend the capacity of each of their users. They are "nature" for postmodern man.”

Rebecca Solnit, a Field Guide to Getting Lost “Leave the door open for the unknown, the door into the dark. That’s where the most important things come from, where you yourself came from, and where you will go.”